Smokey Bones BBQ & Grill 3302 High Point Rd Greensboro, NC 27407 (336) 315-8755 +++++++++++++++++++++ Smokey Bones Barbeque & Grill 1891 Skibo Road Fayetteville, NC 28303 {In front of Cross Creek Mall} Phone: 910-864-1068 http://www.smokeybones.com By H. Kent Craig

Addenda Review Of Their Greensboro Location: March, 2008

My wife and I stopped by the Greensboro location (location, not franchise, since all Smokey Bones are corporately owned and operated) of Smokey Bones the other night and what we were served affirmed my/our original review from 2006 . . . my fine-pulled pork was succulent, sweet, and yes exuding a very real hardwood coal-cooked smokiness with a light tangy slightly vinegar sauce that just burst onto the tastebuds that made a craving for more inevitable . . . and my wife's ribs, both her St. Louis-style and her more traditional Memphis-style were so perfect to her that she deliberately saved half or so of them to eat later for lunch at her work.

And the cornbread, my goodness, has always tasted more like a cornmeal-based angel food cake than baked cornbread . . . and their baked potatoes while not quite top-of-the-line steakhouse were never the less very tasty and thoroughly cooked without being dried out . . . the texture of the pulled pork has actually improved, going from a more pig-pickin' style of rough chunks which were coarsely hand-pulled to a more consistent what I called "fine pulled" where the meat is presented as long and thin but lean shreds but not chopped and most importantly to me, the meat is extremely "clean" with all the nasty bits groomed out before serving.

Even though SB reeks of corporate barbecuism from the too-perfect log interior to the audio selectors for the various TV's at each booth to the linen tablecloths and napkins (yeah) and almost always said places aren't worth wasting the gas to get to let alone actually spending your hard-earned money once there, Smokey Bones is definitely the 4-pig rated exception to this stereotype, offering an authentic pork and beef barbecue fare equal to the very best of the very best.

Original Review Of Their Fayetteville Location: February, 2006

Smokey Bones "hand-pulled pork platter" is, simply put, the best pork barbecue I've had in twenty years, no reservation, no exception.

As much as I love and am somewhat emotionally attached (I admit it) to my favorite 4-pig-rated Eastern-NC-Style places, Cooper's, Bullock's, Dillard's, Wilber's, etc., for pure sensory overload delight of what barbecue should be, you simply can not find any better than Smokey Bones.

I don't know what it is that makes their barbecue so special, and because they're a corporately-owned chain of restaurants (somewhere around fifty of so, mostly east of the Mississippi, click on their website URL above to find a map showing their various locations), they ain't telling, and I really don't care - as long as they keep making it the same way.

I can tell you what their barbeque does not have in it: it doesn't have the first drop of so-called "liquid smoke" flavoring in it, I know that because I'm allergic to said liquid-smoke and it hasn't caused any stomach upset so far, and it doesn't have any special or exotic spices added to it, either as a rub or a basting or serving sauce.

Their hand-pulled, actually a very fine hand-pulled almost like a rough but consistent long-string shred, pork is slowly cooked over live coals in a cooker/smoker for over eleven hours before it's served and yet the smoke actually brings the meat flavor to the forefront, doesn't detract or overwhelm the base-pork flavor at all, quite an accomplishment if you ask me, and they're a chain to boot which makes this even more amazing (I've eaten at the one in Fayetteville NC a handful of times and the one in Greensboro NC once).

Think of Smokey Bones this way . . .

. . . It's the summer of The Year Of Our Lord 1806, not 2006, and your church diocese is holding a fifty-year-reunion for all present and past members which means that hundreds of people will be coming from all over The South to attend and you want to make a good impression as host-church so you hire simply the best barbecue chef in all of The Carolinas to help ensure that the pig-picking-feast to follow as part of it is a rousing success . . . they slowly smoke a slew of hams and shoulders and whole hogs and then finish cooking them atop racks over hot hardwood coals before carefully removing all burned bits of flesh and bone, all cracklin's and globs of fat, leaving only perfectly cooked hand-pulled pork-meat to serve to your honored guests . . . this is the image I get in my mind every time I visit a Smokey Bones; the emotional connection, common to all great food served by all great restaurants, that it brings is palpable.

And they also have, according to wife, stepdaughter, other family and friends, an eclectic but themed menu featuring ribs that my wife absolutely loves (she's more of a rib person than a barbecue one, and thinks their baby-back ribs are the best she's ever had) and smoked beef brisket a friend from Texas also drools over and even my stepdaughter - who is a vegetarian no less - loves Smokey Bones because she can get things she likes, such as their pan-cornbread that comes served in an authentic cast iron skillet and a "Lodge Salad" which she says is a meal in and of itself and they even have authentic collard greens for the true Southern in all of us and their hushpuppies while a tiny bit onion-y are still the balanced compliment to the pork and other meat dishes.

Weak spots? None that we've found so far, but then again we haven't eaten our way through the menu as we like to do with good places we discover. I don't mind admitting that as much as I love good Texas-style beef brisket bar-b-q, I seriously doubt I'll ever order it from Smokey Bones - the recommendation of my Texas friend aside who loves it - because when I go to Smokey's, I go there to eat what I know will make a soul-connection to me, their hand-pulled pork barbecue. On one occasion, during a 3PM day-to-evening shift change at their Fayetteville NC location, our service was a little spotty, took about half an hour for our entrees to be served, but other than that, no complaints, and that had nothing to do with the food.

Even if you're not hungry and don't know exactly where a given Smokey's might be, all you have to do is follow your nose once you get near it, the wafting smell of another place in another time will lead you and your then-rising appetite all the way home.



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